#WMTC18: Ok, Google. Take me to the nearest winery.

Learn about the rise of voice search and how wineries can use voice search strategies to drive real visitor traffic. With connected devices and voice recognition quickly becoming part of our daily activities, wineries need to be ready for the day when consumers search for a winery nearby using voice search rather than by using a search engine.

Session presented by Scott Fish, 32 Degrees Digital

Transcript

1. VOICE SEARCH OK, GOOGLE: TAKE ME TO THE CLOSEST WINERY SCOTT FISH, 32° DIGITAL 2018 WINE & MARKETING TOURISM CONFERENCE
2. Ok, who is Scott Fish? Scott Fish Founder, 32° digital From the city of roses, doing my best to keep Portland Weird. Racquetball player, traveler, plays with corgis!
3. OK, Google. Take Me to the nearest winery. Voice Search, the fastest growing segment of search… …How to achieve Position Zero How to drive customers to your winery location via voice search.
4. OK, here’s today’s agenda. • Voice search trends & defining voice search • Position Zero & Rich Snippets • Why voice search matters for the wine industry • Optimizing for voice search & Position Zero • Ok, what’s next?
5. OK, what are the voice search trends? • Google says that 55% of teens and 41% of adults currently use voice search more than once a day. • 20% of Google searches and 25% of Bing searches contained a voice search in 2017. • 24% of those searchers are looking for local businesses / content & it’s growing! • Already 22% of people say they trust voice search with ecommerce transactions. • ComScore predicts that Voice Search will be 50% of all searches by 2020.
6. OK, so what is voice search? • Start by asking your personal assistant or device a question. • The “best answer” will be returned. Google Knowledge Graph is driving these search results. • Often Informational queries are made, with structured data returned as results. • Quick Answer, it’s not in-depth content or a long customer journey. • Who, When, Where, How? • You have an opportunity to be the answer.
7. OK, what is the voice search ecosystem?
8. OK, what is the voice search ecosystem?
9. OK, all of the voice search talk is annoying, isn’t it? In a study by StoneTemple, about 35% of people say voice command talking is annoying. This is better than last year, when 52% thought it was annoying.
10. OK, tell me about Position Zero. Position 0 is the rich snippet that you often see above other traditional search results. 80% of Google Home voice search results derive from Rich Snippets.
11. OK, tell me about Position Zero. Google crawls pages and determines the best answer, often pulling into the search result much more than the traditional 10 blue links. This is a huge opportunity for wineries and AVAs to capitalize on rich content snippets to drive more traffic. Position ZERO drives VOICE SEARCH.
12. OK, is this really a big deal? As Google and other voice search platforms continue to seek the best answer based on your search intent – Rich Snippet results continue to grow. In fact roughly 30% of all searches currently trigger a Position ZERO result now. (Stone Temple) Rich Snippets are not long and wordy – The average length is 56 words long. Rich Snippets need to be structured (h1,h2, schema.org, ALT text in images)
13. OK, who is benefiting from this? Many technical industries are seeing growth including healthcare & financial. Local businesses & brands are quickly growing in search query volume. Local businesses: “Best” & “Reviews” are commonly searched.
14. OK, tell me why this matters for my business. HitWise Data 2018
15. OK, tell me why this matters for my business. • Voice Searches tend to be about 3x more likely to be local based. • 31X more likely to take an action based on search results (directions, call) • 8.6% CTR on Position Zero (brands see a 114% increase in CTR if they are ranking 3-10 on the page) • Tourism industry sees a 300% increase in traffic when ranking in Position Zero.
16. OK, I want to take advantage of voice search & Position ZERO. How do we optimize for Position ZERO? What kind of keywords matter for voice search? How does my SEO Strategy affect all of this?
17. OK, how do we optimize for Position ZERO? First Step: You must have a traditional search result in the top 10. Content, Code and Credibility must be present. Probability of having Position Zero is based on SERP rank.
18. OK, what kind of keywords matter for voice search? What & Who How When Where INTERESTED TAKING ACTION
19. OK, what kind of keywords matter for voice search?
20. OK, how does my SEO strategy effect voice search? Google recently made changes for a site to be indexed “mobile first,” and many of the technical items also matter for voice. • Site Speed • Schema Markup • Crawlable content Ensure that you don’t hinder the search engines
21. OK, how does my SEO strategy effect voice search? On Page SEO strategies drive better rankings, which means you open your site up to being able to show up for voice search results. • Strong on page structure & organization (schema, H1s) • Title tags still matter (you have 70 characters, use them!) • Image optimization (ALT text, use non-stock images) • Internal links (you can still shape how Google sees your site)
22. OK, how does my SEO strategy effect voice search? Off Page SEO helps to drive credibility and 3rd party validation for your site. Links & citations are the supporting cast for your content. • Local citations (map listings, yelp, tripadvisor, others) • Local AVAs & Tourism Partners (leverage each other’s authority) • Content Marketing (online publication inclusion) • Site Host IP & Trust (make sure your neighborhood is safe)
23. OK, what’s the future of voice search? A growing number of voice searches are local and transactional searches. Video results will see growth in the future and likely will see more play time. Google says…. more than 50% of regular smart speaker users want to hear information about deals and promotions. Can I advertise on voice search results? Not yet. Amazon Alexa Skills are currently not allowing advertisements; however they may integrate these in the future. Amazon would like brands to focus on engagement and useful content.
24. OK, what’s the future of voice search? Near Me. Over the last two years, the “near me” mobile search has seen a 500% increase in volume when combined with “to buy,” “can I buy,” or a similar phrase, according to a comparison of Google Data from July-December 2015 and July-December 2017. A related mobile search that has recently surged in frequency is “near me today/tonight.” That phrase increased by 900% in the same period.
25. OK, what’s the future of voice search? Targeting the millennial. 35.8% of millennials use voice-enabled digital assistants at least once a month, per eMarketer; this compared to just 10.1% of baby boomers. The number of millennials who use voice-enabled digital assistants will climb to 39.3% in 2019, per eMarketer.
26. OK, THAT’S ALL! SCOTT FISH, 32° DIGITAL PORTLAND, OR // VANCOUVER, WA 32DIGITAL.COM/CRUSH SCOTT@32DIGITAL.COM